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This article traces the origins and development of the Berber movement in Morocco in order to draw a picture of the different stages in the process of appropriating the notion of ethnicity, the different characters it has taken on and its incorporation in global networks. It examines the transformation that has taken place between a discourse involving heritage to one of defence of a Berber identity that stretches beyond the borders of nation states. In order to do that, it highlights how the Berber movement emerged from Rabat intellectual circles, its networks of influence and how it built up at national level, to gain an insight into the way it acquired international scope through the concept of a Berber diaspora. Placing of this movement in the institutional and political context should allow us to grasp the nature of the legitimacy it advocates: recognition culturally (by means of a definite place in the media, in research, etc.), in linguistic terms (status of their language, standardization, education) and in the political dimension (federalism, democracy, secularity). In dealing with these aspects, this article re-examines the link with field research practice based on a single standard approach to the benefit of a “multi-site” form [Marcus, 1998] which embraces a more discursive analysis and provides a description of the background political and historic situation. “Local culture” can only be defined in relation to references which go beyond it.